Tag: Op-Ed

People inherently long to be part of a group, a village, a community. For communities to endure, they must have a history, and each generation must perpetuate the traditions of the past and pass them along to the next generation. Some such traditions are intentionally created and integrated into society at a young age, such as saluting the flag, reciting the Pledge of Allegiance, and singing the National Anthem. Others are more organic, like family picnics and watching fireworks on Independence Day. In a small town near where I grew up, the biggest annual event was the “irrigation festival,” celebrating the bountiful harvests made possible by the technology that brought water to what was otherwise an arid valley. In a small community, people seize upon whatever it takes to bring people together to eat, play, compete with each other, and socialize. These events are part of the fabric of our civilization.

The common experiences that occur during four years of college similarly bring a community of students together in many ways. Traditions within a college bind class to class, generation to generation, and bring current students from every academic pursuit a sense of togetherness and community and a bond of kinship. Many such college traditions are a bit odd or idiosyncratic, but they form a part of the identity of a school that every student carries away from commencement and (hopefully) brings back for class reunions. The attraction of oddball college traditions was summed up in one article: “[C]ampus traditions are a huge part of what takes a bunch of students, and makes them a community that lasts a lifetime.”

Examples abound throughout the country. At Regis University in Denver, after four nights of enforced quiet study in the week leading up to finals, the signal is given for the “all hall scream,” and students spend ten minutes screaming, laughing, and running through the halls.

At Occidental College, where Barack Obama spent his first two years before transferring to Columbia, tradition dictates that on your birthday you will be thrown into the campus fountain (by your friends). During the “Pterodactyl Hunt” at Swarthmore College, students don garbage bags and roam campus beating each other with foam weapons. At the University of Virginia, students run naked across the campus lawn and kiss the statue of Homer in the days leading up to graduation.

And the Ivys are not too elite to participate in quirky traditions. At the University of Pennsylvania, students throw pieces of toast onto the football field after the end of the third quarter of home games. (The university has designed a special Zamboni-like machine to vacuum up the stray bread.) During the winter carnival at Dartmouth, a hole is drilled into the ice of a local pond, and students jump into the freezing water (with a safety rope).

What traditions bind together the generations of Columbia alumni? There are few, other than the Core Curriculum. In the Wikipedia entry for Columbia University, there are only three entries under “Traditions.” They are (1) Orgo Night, (2) the tree lighting and Yule log ceremony, and (3) the Varsity Show. The first one on the list, Orgo Night, is one of the most unique traditions in all the land, and it is unfortunately under attack.

When you search“quirky college traditions” on Google, the first search result is an article from the website “collegeraptor” titled “13 of the weirdest college traditions.” The article begins:

“There are strange things happening at college campuses across the country. Students are nailing their shoes to trees, howling at the moon, and kissing statue’s bums with no one giving these weird pastimes a second thought.”

The #1 entry on this list is: “Orgo Night: Columbia University.” The article notes the essence of the event:

“Each year, on the eve of the orgo final, the Columbia marching band heads to the library to entertain all of the orgo students (and anyone else lucky enough to be studying at that time) with the fight song, jokes, and music. The tradition is a great harmless way for students to blow off steam during finals.”

The website then links to other information about Columbia for the benefit of users who are researching different schools. You would think that Columbia administrators would be proud that their school ranks #1 (on this list) in yet another aspect of American universities.

In fact, the Orgo Night tradition is listed in all six of the top search results on Google, where articles from BuzzFeed, USA Today, and hercampus.com list the most interesting and memorable events on campuses across the country. In all cases, Orgo Night is lauded as a fun stress reliever for students during finals week.

On Columbia’s official web site, there is a prominent entry on Orgo Night among the stories that alumni were invited to write about their memories of the Columbia experience as part of the C250 (250th anniversary) celebration. University editors chose this as one of the best stories:

“One of my most memorable experiences at Columbia was Orgo Night in the undergraduate reading room in Butler Library. I attended Orgo Night in all eight semesters I was at Columbia. Each was an experience of its own. . . .[T]he show of school spirit was unmatched . . . Cheers to Columbia and its passionate students who continue to fight for our school’s age-old traditions.”

Meanwhile, in a printed recruitment brochure for high school , Columbia lists fifteen items as “Fun on campus” events that new students can look forward to.

It is debatable whether student government budget meetings, University Professor lectures, or Engineering Weeks belong in the “fun” column, but it is significant that Orgo Night is on the university’s official list. In another recruiting brochure titled “Columbia Blue,” the university’s office of undergraduate admissions lauds various traditional campus activities, including Bacchanal, the Varsity Show, the President’s annual Fun Run, and Orgo Night:

“Orgo Night Merriment. The night before the Organic Chemistry Final — Orgo Night. On this night in December and again in May, the main study room in Butler Library starts getting packed around 11:30 pm. You see practically everyone you know and despite being finals week, everyone is excited and happy. At midnight sharp, you hear the sound of instruments and all of a sudden, the marching band storms into the room playing songs and reading jokes while the rest of us are standing on the tables and chairs dancing and laughing. Debbie Goodman, Lido Beach, NY; CC”

All this would suggest that the university administration values Orgo Night as something that is unique to Columbia. It is a living demonstration of how a peculiar tradition can provide some needed stress relief during an otherwise tense finals period and can serve as an heirloom that generations of Columbia alumni share as a common memory.

And yet, if you did not already know, the current University Administration has decided to end this tradition, claiming that the Orgo Night show is not an appropriate activity for Butler Library and relegating the marching band to performing the show outside, on the steps in front of the library in whatever weather might present itself. Banishing Orgo Night from the library is intended to diminish its significance and disassociate it from the process of finals studying. The Head Librarian who announced the ban in December of 2016 justified it based on the need to preserve quiet study space, although the University had received no complaints from students who were unable to find other appropriate study space or who were surprised by the appearance of the band at the well-publicized time and place that had occurred every semester since 1975. Despite protests by students and alumni, the University has remained resolute in its desire to kill the Orgo Night tradition.

This leaves only the tree-lighting and the Varsity Show as traditions common to present and past Columbia students – along with reading The Iliad. Will this improve the feeling of community and connection for future alumni? Will it make any students feel better about the university knowing that the administration took action to preserve their quiet study space during finals week? Years from now, the class of 2018 will remember the Orgo Night in December of 2016 when it was eighteen degrees and the valves in the band’s horns froze up after they were banished from the library. They will remember the notice sent out from Low Library in April of 2017 stating that the administration was “working closely” with the current band leadership to discuss the future of Orgo Night, when in fact there was no communication of any kind from the administration to the band, and none would follow that whole summer. They will remember how the tradition of Orgo Night was stubbornly perpetuated by the marching band despite the administration’s continued “war on fun.” They will probably lament that they are one of the last classes that can remember Orgo Night. As they mingle with the younger alumni from the classes of 2023 and 2028 and 2033 at a future class reunion, someone is bound to mention Orgo Night and some younger alumnus will say “I’ve heard of that, but by the time I was a student, it had died out.” That will be a sad day, but one that is entirely predictable, and apparently one desired by President Bollinger, who is the chief executioner in the crusade to end Orgo Night.

It is not too late to change this course; the scrappy marching band continues to plan an Orgo Night show despite the administration’s resistance. We, who love Columbia, should care. When Orgo Night is just a distant memory for a diminishing population of older alumni and someone laments the absence of enduring traditions that link current students to previous generations, we will all share the blame. We had Orgo Night, and we let it die.

After reading a post about the Free Time Initiative, junior Robbie Netzborg shared his personal experience with mental health on campus and his opinion on the matter on Facebook. Here’s what he had to say.

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Content Warning: suicide, mental health

Note: There are people with lots of extenuating circumstances, and I wholeheartedly agree that the university can and should do more to help people with these circumstances succeed at Columbia.

I’m usually not someone who writes on Facebook, but something really rubbed me the wrong way about your post on the Free Time initiative and I’ve just noticed this as a general idea that people have here. Sorry if my post seems confrontative or annoying, I genuinely do not mean to cause anyone to feel personal harm. But, as students, how can we honestly look at the university and blame them entirely for the stress culture here? What more can the university do to help reduce the stress culture here on campus?

Imagine yourself in the position of the university. You have collected from all around the United States and the world, from a wide-range of backgrounds, students who have pushed themselves to succeed academically — or, at the very least, students who have that as some sort of priority. We students push ourselves to our limits on a constant basis, whether it be to sign up for just one more class, work one more job, go to one more protest, or to fight one more fight. These students, understandably, will try to do anything to pursue their goals, to be the best that they can possibly be, but then we find ourselves here.

Before we know it, when we were all at the top of our classes, we’re now just a regular person in a large pool of people (what could be more insulting for the overachiever?). Success is something that should be given when you make it here but suddenly it doesn’t seem like it. All our peers around us are so much smarter than we are, they seem to be so much more capable than we are. You play an instrument? Good for you, the person next to you plays five at a professional level. You like math? That’s cute, I was doing real analysis by the time I got out of the womb. Our talents that previously marked our identities, that used be something you’d love to share with people, are now threatened. Our identities are threatened. For some people, to overcome that threat, they push themselves beyond their limits.

Now you’re in the university’s shoes. What do you do? Students need someone to talk to. Open up a mental health center on campus that provides therapy through walk-in hours, group sessions, and scheduled appointments. Students are stressed out from pushing themselves to their limits. Lower the credit limit. Give advice (albeit sometimes really, really horrible advice) on how to better manage your time. As an organization, you make an attempt to help the people who are members of that organization.

Now, to digress, I’d like to talk about my personal experience and why I’ve decided to write at all. This is, of course, is my personal account and there are plenty of flaws, details, and biases that people can and should point to in my story to qualify it. But, it’s my life here at Columbia regardless, so here it is.

During a particularly bad period in high school I suffered from suicidal thoughts. I never acted on them, and luckily my parents noticed that I was suffering and put me into therapy, and, through a series of events, I was eventually put on antidepressants. By the end of senior year, I felt entirely comfortable and happy in my life and decided to go off of the pills. It seemed like a temporary thing that I had gotten over.

When I came here to Columbia, I was first completed transfixed with everything that was going on. There are so many cool people, interesting classes to take, things to do. I tried to meet as many people as I could and to take the classes that I found the most interesting. Over time, however, the honeymoon period began to end. Whereas before people had been incredibly social, I found myself eating alone staring at the wooden wall in the John Jay bar area. I really didn’t feel like I belonged in the group that I found then, so I felt insignificant.

I’ve kept a journal for the past six years, and here are some of the things that I wrote back then: “Why am I in a friend group that I consider myself hated and unwelcomed in?” and “There’s a sadness within me and I have a feeling it has something to do with this overbearing sensation of self-disdain.” (Sorry, I like to wax poetic in my journal). As the first semester ended, I felt miserable. To cut things short, life didn’t really feel worth living. When I came back second semester, things only got worse. Things just kept getting worse and worse. After every single failed social interaction or academic test I’d go back to my room and think to myself, “Why the fuck am I alive?” I’d then let my eyes drift towards the window and think about how the exit was right there, and all I had to do was jump. All the thoughts were there, the only thing missing was the spark.

Due to a particularly bad day, I came home to my dorm in tears. I couldn’t take it anymore. I saw myself in the mirror and hated myself. hated who’d I become. Hated everything that I’d done. Hated the very fact that I kept breathing. Without really thinking about it, I ran over towards the window and propped it open and tried to climb out. Luckily, I couldn’t fit through and my roommate happened to come back a couple moments later. Deus ex machina I guess.

After going to bed that night, I woke up the next day in a more stable mood and realized the gravity of what I had just tried to do. There are two factors that led me to still be here today. First was the fact that I had already gone to therapy before and knew (and know) that therapy could be a possible solution (but, the question that bugged me was, is life worth living if I’m never going to be able to be happy?). The second, and much more important, was that a distant-ish friend reached out to me. Not someone who I was spending a majority of my time with. Not someone I considered to be incredibly close to. They said that they were there for me if I needed anyone to talk to and that the university has resources if I needed them. After talking with them, I called CPS and had an appointment the next day.

Now, as a junior, life’s a whole lot better here, but it could have been a completely different story. And here’s the reason why I decided to share what happened to me and why I’m posting here at all: the main thing that got me over my depression and my suicidal thoughts was the fact that I was lucky enough to have a friend who happened to reach out to me when I was at my worst and point me in the right direction.

Here’s the question I pose, though, to every single Columbia student: when was the last time you reached out to a friend who seemed down? When was the last time you walked over to someone sitting in that damned John Jay bar area and started talking to them? I’ve walked around this campus, sat in random places, and just watched people interact with one another. We don’t talk to strangers. No one bothers to ask the person who’s sitting alone whether or not they’d want to join them or how they’re doing. I remember sitting in John Jay holding back tears because I felt so alone.

Now, I read the post about how the university’s not doing enough to support mental health initiatives. What the fuck can the university do for me when I’m all by myself? When I’m sitting alone with no friends or having friends close enough to spend time with me but not close enough to seriously help me out, what should the university do? Will the university pay people to pity me enough to spend time with me and genuinely become my friend? Will I become best friends with Dean Kromm?

Columbia has an empathy problem, and every one of us is responsible for maintaining it. If anyone who is serious about making a difference in mental health here on campus is reading this, stop blaming the university (although there’s plenty of blame on their part), and go out and do what you can do to seriously change one of your peer’s lives. Reach out to the friends you haven’t seen in a while or who seem distant. If you see someone sitting by themselves at a dining hall, talk to them! The mental health issue at Columbia is something that we as students can overcome, if we choose to do so. It’s just lip-service to go around blaming the university if you’re not willing to actually do something personally to help your community. There are so many unhappy people here on campus, but it doesn’t have to be this way. We the student body, not the university, can do something about it other than writing nasty letters. We have to make Columbia a place where people who feel like they’re suffering can lean on the person next to them for support, not a place where a person feels like they’re in an uphill battle against the world.

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As we have these conversations about stress culture and mental health, we think it is important to share some of the resources available on campus to members of the Columbia community:

After seeing the Commitment Time Management page on CSA’s website, senior Lesley Cordero sent this email to Dean Boyce to inform her about the issues with it. Here’s what she had to say.

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Dear Dean Boyce,

As you probably know, the Center for Student Advising recently released this article on time management. I have some serious concerns about the content of this post that I want to share with you.

To quickly summarize, they essentially recommend/outline ~50 hours of studying and~16 hours of class time, totaling to about 66 hours (mind you, this assumes only 15 credits, which as you know you literally cannot graduate with in SEAS). Ignoring the rest of the content momentarily, this expectation lacks thought or concern for your students. Previously, I believed administration was just unaware or doubted how much time we dedicate to classes and school work. Given this post, it’s evident that they are, in fact, aware, which is actually far more alarming. Why is this outrageous workload not being challenged?

Aside from the ethical concerns of working students to such a high number of hours, compared to our peer institutions, we do not seem to outperform other institutions (two simple but powerful examples: number of Rhode Scholars here, number of Fulbright students here), so why is it that we’re working more? For reference, you can check this article on how Columbia students stay up later than all other universities. It’s also important to note that Columbia, not other Ivy League institutions or other top tier universities, had 7 suicides within a year’s time, likely as a result of some of the factors I review in this email.

Furthermore, overworking isn’t an efficient or healthy strategy for producing good work, whether that be research, projects, or just general knowledge learned. In this publication on worker productivity, you’ll see that an increase in number of hours worked has diminishing returns. Here, you’ll also see research on the effects of chronic stress which include diminished health and psychological capacity.

With all that said, I would also like to speak from own experience here at Columbia. I chose to attend a school like Columbia because I love being challenged. Learning, working on meaningful projects and work, excites me to no end, and I genuinely believed that Columbia would be the perfect place to spend my late teens and early twenties working to become my best young adult self.

Columbia has given me so much — friends I genuinely love, countless academic and professional opportunities. But it has failed to cultivate the excitement I came in with as an ambitious and passionate first year. School and academia no longer carries the same positive, growth-driven mindset it once used to. Instead, I’ve grown to associate school with chronic stress, tiredness, and a culture that never seems to keep its student body at ease.

I think this is particularly true for students of color, first generation/low-income students, and anyone whose identities this institution was not built to serve. As outlined in the post this email is about, those calculations are made with the “typical” student in mind, which tends to not be of color or low-income.

To highlight some of the striking misguided calculations:

1. Medical appointments counting for free time is inconsiderate to students with disabilities, many of whom have to spend a large portion of that “free time” on appointments. I, for one, do as a student with a neurological disability.

2. Even on a very simple level, small things like hygiene and professional development are more time consuming for students of color, women, and FLIP students. As a woman of color, I face unique challenges in how the world perceives me. Other students might be able to get away with being unkept — for women and especially women of color, we’re far more scrutinized.

3. 65+ hours of class and work disregards the limitations students with disabilities might have. For many, working long hours is not plausible and even detrimental to their health. As someone with remaining symptoms from a head injury a few years ago, it’s a sacrifice to spend so much extra time on work. I do it because it’s essentially a requirement, but it’s a sacrifice — a sacrifice I would argue isn’t fair to students like me.

4. I’ve had to take up work-study throughout the majority of my time at Columbia, and 8 hours is often a conservative estimate for low income students. Additionally, when you’re on a budget, getting food cheaply (or through free venues) is time consuming. Underestimating those serious challenges fails to appreciate the hard work low-income students put into being a student at Columbia.

There are countless other ways in which these calculations grossly misrepresent the experiences of many students at Columbia. However, I want to emphasize the danger of these misguided calculations. It’s not a matter of pointing out inaccuracies; rather, consider how this high demand workload affects its students and especially its disabled students and students of color. 9 hours a week of free time is not a number we should condone or be proud of.

Now that this post has been released, however, it’s time to radically reconsider the ways we can improve our culture on campus. This means more than suggesting time management skills or having stress buster events. This means institutional change. This means reduced requirements. This means financial aid for 9 or 10 semesters for low-income students.This means more psychological health services. This means more administrative support and listening to students.

I know you want the best Columbia possible. I do too, which is why I decided to reach out to you and share my thoughts and experiences on such an important challenge we’re facing as a community. Thank you for taking the time to read this email, and I hope to see a better Columbia soon.

Best,
Lesley Cordero

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Note: Since this letter was written, Dean Valentini has claimed that this chart was not in fact recent but outdated, as reported by Bwog.

As we have these conversations about stress culture and mental health, we think it is important to share some of the resources available on campus to members of the Columbia community:

Image made by Laura Elizabeth Hand, CC’19

Content Warning: sexual assault

As everyone reels from the news about Harvey Weinstein, the question of inequality for women in Hollywood finds itself once again at the forefront of conversation. Behind the camera, women are coming forward with stories of sexual assault, and we’re finally engaging in a conversation that should have begun years ago. But… what about in front of the camera?

In her acceptance speech at last month’s Emmys, Best Actress winner Nicole Kidman explained that she and Reese Witherspoon produced Big Little Lies to create “more great roles for women.” She was met with thunderous applause acknowledging her role in Lies as “great.” But I was lost.

Over the summer, I binged-watched probably hundreds of episodes of television and saw every movie in theaters. And there were, indeed, great female roles. Elisabeth Moss’s Offred was a strong feminist, Kimmy Schmidt made her way to college, Wonder Woman dominated at the box office, Anne of Green Gables made a triumphant return to television, and the women of This Is Us, Veep, The Crown, and so much more were complex and inspiring.

But when I turned to Kidman’s Big Little Lies, I couldn’t help but gasp at the tireless repetition of sexist tropes and same old plotlines. For those who don’t know, Big Little Lies follows four different mothers in an upper-middle class suburban town. Madeline, played by Reese Witherspoon, is the town gossip and an overbearing and self-centered mother. Jane, played by Shailene Woodley, is a single mom, new in town, with a troubled past. Her son, Ziggy, gets into trouble with Renata Klein, the hard-working businesswoman whose daughter claims Ziggy hurt her. And Kidman’s character, Celeste, is a stay-at-home mom who’s hidden the truth about her abusive husband for years.

If you look at the logline, you may buy Kidman’s claim about “great roles for women.” Save for perhaps Witherspoon’s one-dimensional character (who’s literally portrayed as if Elle Woods just grew up a tiny bit), the rest of the women indeed seem complex. But rather than focusing on the crux of the women’s troubled stories, the show spends the bulk of its time rehashing the fight fight between Jane and Renata’s children. While the fight begins with a serious accusation, before long it becomes clear that Ziggy didn’t hurt Renata’s daughter, and that the fight has spiraled into an all-out war over who works harder: the working moms or the stay-at-home moms. By the end of the first episode, everyone in town has taken sides, and suddenly it’s like you’re watching a glorified version of a middle-school cat fight, but with birkin bags instead of friendship bracelets.

The subplots are equally uncompelling, and wouldn’t pass the Bechdel Test if you gave them all the leeway possible. Madeline can’t seem to get her new husband to get along with her old one, or convince the town to let her put on a production of Avenue Q. These are ridiculously privileged problems, yet the show makes them out to be as dramatic as the abuse Celeste is experiencing at home. Madeline finally connects with her teenage daughter by admitting that she cheated on her new husband. Oh great, isn’t that wonderful motherly guidance? Meanwhile, Renata doesn’t have sex often enough with her husband, and her poor daughter can’t get enough kids to come to her million-dollar birthday party.

But while all this is happening, the only two characters with the possibility for a compelling subplot also fall short. A few episodes into the series, we learn that Jane was raped and she fears that Ziggy will inherit his father’s violent tendencies, but this intriguing storyline barely gets any airtime. Celeste finally works up the nerve to go to a therapist, and the show’s only truly “great” female moments are in Kidman’s painfully accurate portrayal of a woman struggling to come forward about abuse. When Celeste finally decides to leave her husband, the depiction of women on the show finally feels empowered.

But within one episode, everything swings back again. In the final scene, at a ridiculously over-the-top school function, Celeste’s husband discovers she’s leaving and starts to hit her. Coming to her defense, Madeline, Jane, Renata, and one other woman hit him back, and we learn that Celeste’s abusive husband was the man who raped Jane all those years ago. Finally, the women accidentally push him over a cliff and kill him. It was an act of self-defense, and the audience breathes a sigh of genuine relief and hope for Celeste’s brighter future.

But then, they deny the murder. In talking to the police, not one woman comes forward with the truth. He simply fell, they say. In talking to the police, not one woman comes forward with the truth. Why? I’m not sure. In their silence, the women of Big Little Lies end their show not with a message of the importance of speaking out for victims of abuse, but of the harmlessness of staying silent. Suddenly, everything about the show—Kidman’s character and even Jane’s intriguing subplot—seems far too convenient. For Jane, the question of her own PTSD and her son’s violent tendencies are suddenly resolved. And true, it seems like Celeste was about to finally stand up and leave, but by choosing to kill off the abuser, the writers eliminate the incredibly difficult period abused women struggle through, physically and emotionally, to take that step away. If this were a real woman, Jane’s and Celeste’s struggles would not be over with a timely shove off of a cliff and a promise to never speak of it again. Abuse lives with people forever.

The show ends with a reconciliation. Like they’re in middle school again, Madeline, Jane, Celeste, and Renata are suddenly friends, joined together with a secret. But let me put it plainly: abuse is not a cute little secret you share with your friends. Abuse is not a problem that deserves less screen time and the same dramatic emphasis as does the question of whether to put on Avenue Q. Abuse is real, abuse is terrible, and abuse doesn’t resolve itself that easily.

Big Little Lies took home five Emmys this year. In her acceptance speech, Nicole Kidman said that the show helped “shine a light” on abuse. Maybe, but the small light the show shines is not enough. The women in the show aren’t “great”: they’re simple, naive, entitled, and don’t reflect the true complexities that women like Celeste and Jane (or even real-life Madelines) face every day. And in an industry where actresses experience sexual harassment every day and a world where men like Harvey Weinstein find success, Hollywood needs to do better.

So yes, Ms. Kidman: you’re right. Hollywood does need more great roles for women. But I’m afraid this wasn’t it.

Take 3(4x +7) = 45. I’m sure all of you remember how to prove that this obviously is true. You have to rewrite the equation to distribute the 3 into 4x+7 to get 12x + 21 equals 45. Then, you have to subtract 21 from both sides to get 12x=24. And finally, you divide both sides by 12 to get the answer, x =2. This, again, being obvious, I would just write the answer, x=2. It wasn’t as if math stopped working if I didn’t write out the three steps on my homework along with the answer. The answer would always be two, so why did I have to waste what little energy I had on one of 46 questions I had every evening for homework?

That argument did not save me from losing points on my assignments in 7th grade.

While I love questions about how a government operates and how we justify government action much more than I loved my algebra proofs, I can see why it’s tedious. Sure, prosecutors should focus on true threats to the community and not otherwise law-abiding citizens, the executive branch in the modern era is given significant discretion on how to enforce legislation; it’s fine if the de facto result of prosecutorial discretion means that a certain group of people already determined as safe have some guarantee of safety; and amnesty through this understanding is not the worst thing that has happened to the American rule of law. But did saying any of that make it truer? Would not saying that make it falser? Life, like math, doesn’t change absent the work that went into it. And while proving these complex questions of political theory makes one a better debater, debating the validity of one’s life to everyone who asks is an exhausting exercise of existentialism.

So sure, Joey, we should show our work to the teacher. Maybe it should be in op-ed form, or The Lion, or re:claim, for the sake of posterity. But I think, to stay in math class a moment longer, Undocu is tired of algebra and wants to move on to Accelerated Multivariable Calculus, and would be happy to debate Accelerated Multivariable Calculus, but you insist on debating algebra, and there’s only so many times they can write x=2 before 800,000 pencils snap in unison. I think that’s what they mean by “reconstructed.” Most people don’t question the virtue of DACA recipients. Most Trump-reluctant Republicans prefer to look like they’re being helpful on the issue as is.

And I’m sure you could make a wonderful argument in Accelerated Multivariable Calculus without writing MS minus 13.

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If you’d like to submit an op-ed to The Lion, email submissions@thecolumbialion.com